


Beach Day

by LittleMissWolfie



Series: After [5]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M, Mild Language, Possible noncanon names for Pidge and Lance's mothers, Post-Series, Stereotypical Beach Episode, Swimsuits, established relationships - Freeform, proposal, she/her pronouns for pidge, tw: catcalling
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-09
Updated: 2016-08-09
Packaged: 2018-08-07 15:20:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7719835
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleMissWolfie/pseuds/LittleMissWolfie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>To her surprise, Pidge was the nail in the coffin. The traitor. “Since I have to buy a new one anyway, you should come along. Not all swimsuits are super revealing; you may find one conservative enough for you.”</p><p>Or;</p><p>The Paladins decide they need a day off, so they introduce Allura to the concept of a beach.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Beach Day

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, everyone! This one took a little less time to write, so yay for all of us!
> 
> Once again, I'd like to start by saying thank you to everyone who reviewed the last fic, Adjustments. I didn't reply to them this time, and I hope I didn't hurt anyone's feelings, but I got really into the groove with this story and didn't want to stop. So thank you to AlphaofDarkness, LastOneOut, purple_child, DuelyPostNoted, and guests .. and Cheshire. Every review has been positive, and it means so much to me that you think highly of my writing.
> 
> There isn't much to say about this story, other than it's meant to be a more lighthearted adventure dealing with cultural differences between Altea and Earth. I hope you enjoy it as much as you have the last two! I'm including a question in my end notes, so please make sure to read them.

“I-I don’t know about this, Pidge,” Allura says nervously, tugging on the back of Pidge’s shirt as they walk through the store she and her mother found a few blocks from Lance’s family home. Pidge’s mother, Elizabeth, is next to them, and she appears to be very excited about the prospect of shopping with her daughter and her girl friend. The kind of shopping, however, is another matter entirely.

Posters of half naked women line the walls, scandalizing Allura’s modest nature. Pidge calls them swimsuits. They’re for getting into water for recreational purposes. It’s a strange concept to Allura, as Alteans never really had much to do with water if they could help it. “If we’re going to the beach,” Pidge had commented  the previous evening as they visited with Lance’s family, “I’ll need to get a new swimsuit. My old one is way too small for me now.”

Though Allura hadn’t known why at the time, the male Paladins all turned beet red. “H-how small?” Lance questioned, a bit of saliva dripping from his mouth. His mother noticed, scoffed, and smacked him in the head with a rolled up piece of what everyone called “paper,” eliciting a yelp from him.

Pidge smirked. “Well, I grew boobs and hips since I last put it on, so I’d probably bust right out of it if I tried to wear it.”

“TMI, Pidge!” Keith choked out. From his position beside her, Shiro’s laugh rumbled around her.

“That reminds me!” Lance’s mother suddenly exclaimed. Adalie Rios was a full figured woman, limbs soft and face round and open. She’s paler than her son, who gets his skin tone from his father. “Allura, do you have a swimsuit?” 

Since she didn’t know what a swimsuit was, she looked at Shiro for help. He answered, “Alteans are pretty conservative; they don’t like showing off too much skin.”

Allura felt her face heat up. Swimsuits showed off  _ skin _ ? How scandalous! 

To her surprise, Pidge was the nail in the coffin. The  _ traitor. _ “Since I have to buy a new one anyway, you should come along. Not all swimsuits are super revealing; you may find one conservative enough for you.”

So here they are, walking around a store filled with pieces of clothing so small they wouldn’t cover an Altean child to their modesty standards. “Is this really okay?” Allura asks.

“Don’t worry, dear,” Elizabeth says, patting her on the shoulder as Pidge darts ahead to scope out their options. “This store has a lot of different styles. If you don’t find something you’re comfortable with, you don’t even have to wear one. No one will pressure you.”

Allura blinks up at her. “Thank you, Mrs. Holt.”

Elizabeth laughs. “Call me Elizabeth. Now, come on. My Katie might not look like it, but she’s a shopping fiend when she wants to be.”

\---

Pidge finds a few swimsuits right off the bat and drags Allura to some changing rooms to try them on. Allura finds herself a little relieved; maybe Pidge will forget about trying to get  _ her  _ in one if she’s too busy trying them on herself.

Even with her modest mindset, Allura has to admit that Pidge looks good in the revealing suits she tries on. She’s taken to wearing shorts and tank tops around the castle in recent months, which was already scandalous for her and Coran. They showed off her arms and her legs and her neck, all of which were very private parts of the body to an Altean, but Allura eventually admitted she looked very good. Her muscles have toned over the years of fighting, and Keith once told her it was a bit of a tradition on Earth for women to show off parts of the body they’re proud of. She just assumed Pidge was proud of her  _ entire _ body.

Watching her survey herself in the mirror now, she realizes that’s not correct. Pidge winces at her reflection with almost every one of the suits she tries on. Finally, she groans in frustration. “None of these look  _ good _ on me!”

“I think you look great,” Allura offers. “I don’t see why you don’t think they look good.”

Pidge ducks her head. She’s embarrassed, Allura realizes with a start. “It’s… it’s my muscles.” She gestures to the discarded swimsuits. “These are supposed to  be worn by skinny women with big boobs and tiny arms. And, well…” She gestures to herself. “I’m about as far away from that as you can get.”

This isn’t like Pidge. After those first few months as a team, Pidge morphed into a confident young woman who, in Lance’s words, “gave no shits.” This Pidge is insecure in the body that helped save the universe.

And so Allura comes up with an idea.

“Let’s do this.” She stands from the chair she was sitting in and grasps Pidge’s hands with her own. “I’ll pick out one for you, and you’ll pick out one for me.”

“I’m sensing an  _ and _ here.”

“We try the on to make sure they fit, we buy them, and we  _ have _ to wear them when we go to the beach tomorrow. No excuses.”

Pidge mulls it over. “We have to be serious--pick out something we think we’d look good in. And we each get one request. Deal?”

Allura nods. “Deal. I want something with a high neck.” She’d seen a few suits like that in the store and they were the most appealing to her.

Pidge says, “I want mine to be green,” and they’re off to shop for each other.

\---

Allura feels like she might as well be naked.

Pidge is in her chambers with her, helping her put on the wretched swimsuit she picked out. From just under her breasts to at least an inch below her breasts is completely bare, as is most of the expanse of her back and her legs and her arms. The black fabric is thin and she can barely feel it. As she requested, the neckline is high, resting right below her collarbone, but it’s also lacy and the skin under it is visible. She regrets her deal with Pidge now, but Pidge is more secure in her body, so she thinks it’s a pretty fair exchange. “Shiro’s gonna explode when he sees you,” Pidge mutters as she ties a knot in the strings behind Allura’s neck.

“Why?” Allura asks.

Pidge’s voice is deadpan when she responds, “You’re not serious, right?”

“I thought it was normal to wear revealing clothing on Earth.”

Pidge laughs. “Kinda, I guess? It’s still special. I guess you could say it’s like a courting ritual.”

“Why?”

She seems like she’s struggling with her words for a moment before she answers. “Allura, people get aroused when they see someone they find attractive wearing revealing clothing. Part of the fun of swimsuits is teasing your romantic partner. Testing their resolve, if you will.”

Allura’s lost now. “It’s… a test?”

“To see how well they can control themselves in public.” Pidge groans. “I wish I could explain this better, but just trust me. I’m sure you’ll understand soon enough. Now!” Pidge dances around her so they’re face-to-face. “Let’s get going. We don’t want to keep the boys waiting!”

Much to her relief, Pidge looks really good in the swimsuit she picked out. It’s green, as she requested, with a pale gold floral pattern and a modestly high waist. The top is also more modest than many she saw in the store, with cups that cover her whole breasts, a halter-type (as the shop assistant called it) tie, and a thick band. It accentuates her legs, makes them look longer, and her muscled abdomen isn’t as evident with the high waist. Pidge loves it.

Doing her best to calm her nerves, Allura follows Pidge out of the castle and to the sandy beach. They parked the castle along the expanse of sand, near a treeline, so it’s not too long of a walk. She knows the rest of their team (minus Coran, who played the old man card, as Lance would say, and opted to have a conversation with the rest of the team’s families instead) is already set up somewhere along the shore, but with all the people lounging about, she doesn’t know where they would be. She hopes they set up close to the castle; the less people she has to walk by, in her opinion, the better.

While they walk, Allura hears the sounds of whistles. “What are they doing?” she whispers to Pidge, gesturing at the group of boys producing the noises.

Pidge rolls her eyes and makes a disgusted sound in the back of her throat. “Being pigs.” At Allura’s confused glance, she continues, “What they’re doing is called ‘cat-calling.’ People sometimes do it when they see a person they find attractive in a misguided attempt to get them noticed. In some cases it can be filed as sexual assault.”

The boys apparently decide to up their ante. “Hey, pretty lady!” one calls with a drawl, making a come hither gesture with his finger. “Why dontchu come over here and hang with us for a while?”

“Just ignore them,” Pidge whispers. Her pace quickens, and Allura adjusts to match. “They’ll either stop  or get angry.”

They choose the latter.

“Hey!” Allura is so focused on looking for  _ their _ boys, she doesn’t notice one of the cat-callers sneaking up on them until he’s grabbed onto her arm. “Don’t ignore me, bitch!”

Allura is so shocked at the sudden, uninvited touch that she freezes. Pidge reacts quickly to make up for it, ducking under the offender and kicking his knees out from under him. He crumples, instinctively letting go of Allura as he goes down, and Pidge growls, “Keep your hands off her, fuckboy.”

He takes a moment to recover before he snarls in return. “What the fuck, bitch? She your girlfriend or something?” The words come out as a jeer, and Pidge makes a noise like a wounded animal and makes to launch at him.

“No,” a new voice says. “She’s my girlfriend, and that’s my little sister about to gouge your eyes out.”

“Shiro!” Allura gasps delightedly.

“You’re late, asshole,” Pidge gripes.

“Language,” Shiro admonishes, and Allura takes the chance to admire him. As Pidge had warned her, Shiro was shirtless, revealing his rippling abdominal muscles and the ugly scar where his cybernetic arm connects to his flesh shoulder. She’s able to see the expanse of his pale skin littered with battle scars and she feels a heat in her belly. Panicked, she looks to Pidge, who takes in her red face and smirks.

Shiro takes care of the cat-caller, who runs away so fast Allura’s pretty sure he breaks the sound barrier. “I’m gonna go tell Lance he miss his opportunity to be a white knight,” Pidge says to her before jogging away herself, towards where the rest  of the group is. From the corner of her eye, Allura sees Lance go red and throw a hoodie at Pidge, who laughs and throws it right back.

When Shiro’s confident the cat-caller is gone for good, he turns back around to address Allura, but he freezes as soon as he sees Allura. His mouth hangs open slightly and she sees a vein in his neck start to protrude from under the skin. “Allura,” he attempts, voice cracking a little.

Allura’s heart drops. “Oh, I  _ knew _ this was too much!” she moans, trying to cover her bare skin with her hands. “Pidge said I looked good, but she was probably just saying that, I’ll go change--”

“No!” Shiro’s voice is strangled and his face red, but  his flesh hand on her arm is warm and firm. “You don’t have to change. You - you look  _ great. _ ”

Before Allura can answer, Pidge starts shrieking, and they both whip around to see Lance and Hunk dragging her into the sea. Keith, who is reclining on a towel, shakes his head at the antics and lays fully back. Shiro laughs at their antics. “We should go make sure no one dies,” he says in what Hunk calls his Dad Voice. To her surprise, instead of entwining their fingers like usual, he lets his flesh hand rest on her hip and draws her a little closer than normal.

And she has to admit she likes it.

\---

When lunchtime rolls around, Lance leads them up the beach to a pizza restaurant. Allura doesn’t know what “pizza” is, but everyone else seems excited, so she agrees to it. Now that their group includes four well-built young men, no more cat-callers bother them. Even Pidge, who’s usually pretty surly, is flirting with Lance as they head the group. Shiro has his hand on her hip again, and she lets herself relax. 

Lance bursts into the restaurant like he owns the place, and he may as well, because the owner screams and wraps him in a hug when she sees him. She’s about his mother’s age, Allura supposes, with tanned skin and greying blonde hair. “Lance Rios, who gave you permission to galavant around the universe and leave this pizza shack all by its lonesome?” she jokes, slapping his arm. Then she sees Pidge, who’s holding his hand, and her grin widens. “And who is  _ this? _ ”

Lance and Pidge go red, but Pidge offers her a hand. “My name’s Katie Holt.”

“Oh!” Recognition lights her face. “You’re another Paladin!” Then she surveys the rest of the group and clutches at her chest in an exaggerated manner. “Lance! Why didn’t you warn me the defenders of the universe would come to my establishment?”

They’ve garnered the attention of the rest of the patrons, so Lance quickly calms the woman down and they sit at a table, trying to ignore the rest of the room’s glances. “I’d hoped to avoid a scene,” Shiro says, “but I guess that was wishful thinking.”

They receive their menus and order two large pizzas (Allura still doesn’t know what they are) with various toppings. As they wait for their food, they nurse sodas (which Allura finds she likes a great deal and decides to find a way to stock up on it before the castle returns to Arus) and talk. She finds herself feeling vaguely nostalgic, but she doesn’t know why.

\---

They head back to the shore after lunch (which was as delicious as it was confusing) and Lance proposes a game of “Chicken.” As soon as she hears the words leave his mouth, Pidge drags Allura to their towels. “Nope, fuck that,” she calls behind her, ignoring Shiro’s shouted “Language!”

“What is ‘chicken?’” Allura asks.

Pidge shakes her head, eyes trailing after the boys as they wade into the water. “Just watch.”

When they’re waist-deep, Lance scrambles onto Hunk’s back and Keith climbs on Shiro. They perch themselves on their shoulders, with their partner holding onto their thighs, and begin to grapple. “This looks…” she tries to say, but she can’t come up with anything to follow.

“It’s ridiculous and dangerous,” Pidge supplies. “Someone’s gonna get hurt.”

“Shouldn’t we stop them, then?”

“They wouldn’t listen to us. Boys are dumb.”

Pidge’s prediction comes to fruition after a few rounds of the game when Lance limps back to them, rubbing his head and wincing. The rest of the boys splash around in the water as Lance flops on the towel on Pidge’s other side, letting his hand land in her lap, making her make an “oof” sound. “Kiss my head better?” he asks, giving her a pathetic look.

Pidge smiles down at him and Allura suddenly feels she’s intruding on an intimate moment. “Dumbass,” the younger girl whispers affectionately, bending down to kiss the offending body part. 

Allura feels extremely uncomfortable and is about to find somewhere else to relax when she sees Shiro emerge from the water. Droplets fall from his hair and land on his chest, and quiznak if he’s not the most attractive man she’s ever seen. Her mouth goes dry and her belly tightens, and she’s suddenly overcome with the unbidden thought that,  _ this man is hers. _

Shiro catches her gaze and smiles fondly at her. He mouths, “Wanna take a walk?” and she eagerly stands and moves to link fingers with him. Keith and Hunk, still in the water, make an offended sound in tandem as Shiro gently drags her down the beach. 

\---

She only realizes Shiro has a destination in mind when they come across the rock formation. He gives her  playful grin and says, “Race you to the top?”

“You’re  _ on, _ ” she replies.

It’s the most actual excitement she’s had since the final battle against Zarkon. She’s having fun on Earth, sure, but nothing’s dangerous. Nothing can get her blood pumping like this. The danger is seductive, she finds.  _ Almost as seductive as Shiro _ , a part of her mind tells her. She promptly tells that part to shut up because she can’t beat Shiro if she’s thinking about how much she wants Shiro in her bed.

She ends up winning by a fraction of a second, crowing happily. “Looks like the princess beat her knight,” she says, puffing out her chest proudly. It’s not until she hears the strangled sound Shiro makes that she remembers she’s still wearing the equivalent of undergarments and she flushes, crossing her arms over her chest.

Shiro graciously refrains from commenting on this, instead helping her to her feet and leading her to the edge of the rock. She doesn’t realize how late it’s gotten until she sees the sun setting over the water, casting an orange glow over the now-peaceful beach. “It’s beautiful,” she breathes.

“Lance told me about it,” Shiro says, putting his arm around her. “He was gonna bring Pidge up here but he’s too busy sucking up her ‘attention’ for being hurt.”

She lets herself laugh softly. “She humors him more than I thought she would.”

“It’s kind of bittersweet, don’t you think?”

Allura blinks up at him. “How so?”

“I mean, it almost feels like our kids are growing up, doesn’t it?”

Again, she laughs, but her chest tightens at the word  _ our _ . “We don’t  _ have _ children, silly.”

Quietly, he says, “We could.”

Her face goes red, and she notices Shiro’s is, too. “What?” she asks, her voice cracking and strangled at the same time.

He turns, guiding her as well until they’re face to face. “Allura, I don’t know how marriage works for Alteans--”  _ Marriage! _ “--but I know I want to spend the rest of my life with you. I want to raise kids together, live in the castle together, just…  _ together. _ I love you more than I ever thought possible, and I know that whatever comes next in life, I want you to be by my side.”

Allura definitely isn’t crying, no matter what Shiro will say years later. “If you’d waited any longer,” she teases, “I would have asked you myself.”

A grin overtakes his face and he lifts her in his arms, crashing his lips against hers. The amount of skin pressing together in this embrace would have scandalized any good Altean to the point of near death, but at this moment, Allura doesn’t give a damn. She’s holding the man she’s going to spend the rest of her life with.

~OMAKE~

“What do you think they’re doing up there?” Hunk asks, squinting at the rocks he saw Shiro and Allura climb only moments before. “I mean, there’s not much up there.”

“I’m more concerned about  _ them, _ ” Keith gripes, jerking his thumb to where Lance and Pidge are reclined on the beach. They’re kissing, which isn’t much of a problem since much of the beach has cleared out, but Lance’s hand is cupping Pidge’s butt in a way that makes Hunk  _ very  _ uncomfortable, both as an asexual and as a brother figure. “Hey, guys, get a room!” Keith shouts, startling the pair apart. Pidge looks properly shamefaced, but Lance glares.

“You just need to get laid, dude!” he yells back. Keith throws the beach ball he and Hunk are playing with directly at his face, and Pidge ducks out of the way just in time for it to hit him square in the nose.

He has to pay the hospital bill. It’s worth it.

**Author's Note:**

> Again, I must ask, how was it? I had some fun writing this, but some parts feel kind of awkward, so if you have any pointers, please let me know!
> 
> Now, onto the question. I'm giving you guys a chance to vote on what part you want to see next: a grand ball to commemorate the end of the war, which would predate this one by a week or so, or a Lance-centric story about Lance and Pidge's wedding. I want to write each equally bad, so please let me know your opinion in the comments!
> 
> I hope to see you guys again soon!


End file.
